Job Safety Analysis
JHA · JSA · Pre-Task Planning — Free
A free course on the one piece of paperwork every crew signs and few crews use. Break the job into steps, name what can hurt someone in each step, choose a control that holds, and run the brief so the plan survives contact with the site. 1.5 hours, self-paced, certificate of completion at the end — no card, no trial.
1.5 hours
self-paced, any device
Same day
certificate of completion
1 year
verifies online by code
Free retakes
on the final test, unlimited
JHA, JSA, AHA, PTP — one idea, four names
A job hazard analysis and a job safety analysis are the same document wearing two names. The Corps of Engineers calls it an activity hazard analysis; plenty of general contractors call it a pre-task plan and want one every morning. Whatever is printed across the top, the method underneath is identical: break the work into steps, name what can hurt someone in each step, and decide the control before anybody starts.
OSHA has no standard called “job safety analysis”. What it has is 1926.20(b)(2) — frequent and regular inspections by a competent person — a shelf of standards that each demand a hazard assessment of their own, and the general duty clause underneath all of it. The JSA is how a site answers all of them on one page, which is why it turns up in nearly every prequalification packet and in nearly every incident file afterwards.
It is also the document most often copied from last week and signed at the gate. This course is free, it is short, and it ends with you filling in a real one in our free JSA builder rather than reading about the idea of filling one in.
Read this before you buy from anyone
A JSA is written by the crew doing the work. Nobody can hand you one.
The value of a job safety analysis is in the ten minutes a crew spends arguing about step four, not in the form it ends up on. A template downloaded from a supplier, signed at the gate and filed unread satisfies a folder and nothing else — and it reads that way to any inspector who asks one follow-up question. What this course delivers is the method and the habit, documented with a certificate of completion that verifies online. What it cannot deliver is the site-specific content: your hazards, your controls, your competent person, and the equipment-specific training that half of those controls turn out to require.
The method
How to break a job into steps, find the hazard in each and pick a control that holds — plus a free builder to write the real thing in.
The site
Your hazards, your controls, your competent person, and whatever equipment-specific training those controls turn out to need.
What the training covers
4 modules · 11 lessons, final assessment included. Full lesson list →
- 01
JHA, JSA, AHA and PTP
One idea and four names, what the plan is actually for, and who writes it versus who only signs it.
- 02
Getting the steps right
A step is one action by one person. Too coarse and the hazard hides inside it; too fine and nobody reads to the end.
- 03
Finding the hazard in each step
What to look for and in what order, so the column does not read “slips, trips and falls” three times and stop.
- 04
Controls that actually hold
The hierarchy of controls applied to a real step, and how to tell a control from a wish written in the control column.
- 05
The pre-task brief
Saying it out loud to the crew, getting the objection out of the quiet one, and what to do when the job changes at eleven.
- 06
Signatures, records and handover
What a signature means, what to keep and for how long, and handing the plan to the next shift or to the GC.
Who this free course is for
Anyone who signs a JSA in the morning. Foremen and crew leads write them, safety coordinators collect them, and general contractors read them before they let a sub through the gate.
Foremen and crew leads
You write the plan and you run the brief, and the crew reads how seriously you take both.
Safety coordinators
Building a program from nothing, or replacing a stack of templates nobody fills in properly.
Subcontractors facing prequalification
The GC wants to see the plan and the training behind it before your crew is on site.
Anyone who signs the form
A signature on a hazard analysis is a statement about what you understood, not an attendance record.
How it works
- 1
Enrol
Card checkout, no account needed up front — you set your password the moment you pay.
- 2
Study at your pace
On any device. Progress saves, so you can stop mid-lesson and pick it up on the truck.
- 3
Pass the test
Multiple-choice final assessment. Unlimited retakes, free — nobody pays twice for a second attempt.
- 4
Download the certificate
Issued the same day with a unique code that verifies online for 1 years.
JHA/JSA and Pre-Task Planning
1.5 hours, self-paced, on any device. Unlimited free retakes on the final test. Certificate of completion issued the same day and verifiable online for 1 years.
Frequently asked questions
What is a job safety analysis?
A written breakdown of a task into its steps, with the hazards of each step and the control chosen for each hazard, agreed before the work starts. It is done by the people doing the work, usually the morning of, and it is signed by the crew so that everybody has heard the same plan. Done properly it takes ten or fifteen minutes and changes what people do; done as paperwork it takes two and changes nothing.
Is a JSA the same as a JHA?
Yes. Job safety analysis and job hazard analysis are the same document — OSHA’s own publication uses “job hazard analysis”, most contractors say JSA. Activity hazard analysis (AHA) is the federal-contract name for it, and “pre-task plan” or PTP is what many general contractors call the daily version. If your site asks for any of these, this course covers it.
Is the course really free?
Yes — no card, no trial, no paywall halfway through. You create an account, work through the lessons, pass the final test and download a certificate of completion that verifies online by its own code, the same certificate our paid courses issue. We give it away because crews that write a real JSA find out which controls need training they do not yet have, and we would rather they knew where to find us.
Does OSHA require a job safety analysis?
Not under that name — there is no OSHA standard titled “job safety analysis”. OSHA does require frequent and regular jobsite inspections by a competent person under 1926.20(b)(2), and a long list of individual standards each require their own hazard assessment. A JSA is the practical way sites meet those obligations together, and it is what a compliance officer or a general contractor will ask to see.
Do I get a certificate for a free course?
Yes, the same one. Issued the same day, with a unique code that anyone — a GC, a site checker, an inspector — can verify online. It is a certificate of completion for training, which is what every certificate on this site is.
Can I use this to write a real JSA?
That is the point of it. Our JSA builder is free and public at /tools/jsa: pick your trade, describe the work, and it drafts the steps, hazards and controls into a PDF your crew can sign, with a QR code that pulls the plan up on a phone at the gate. The course teaches you what belongs in each column; the builder saves you typing it.
Is this course OSHA-approved?
No provider’s course is. Outside the OSHA Outreach Training Program — the OSHA 10/30 DOL-card system delivered by OSHA-authorized trainers — OSHA does not approve, accept or certify training. Our courses are built to OSHA standards, and what you receive is a certificate of completion that verifies online by its own code. Whether it satisfies a given site is the employer’s or site owner’s decision.
Can I train a whole crew at once?
Yes. Buy seats once from the team dashboard, assign the course to each worker, and watch completion in real time. You get a certificate roster with QR codes to show a site checker without chasing anyone for paperwork.
What the plan usually calls for next
Write an honest JSA and the control column starts naming training the crew does not have. These are the courses those controls point at most often.
Free
1.5 hours · certificate today